Many utility companies are focusing on zero injuries and their efforts have been paying off, with fewer employees are getting hurt. This is attributed to an arsenal of things such as meaningful safety meetings, applying injury prevention theories, ergonomic tools, detailed job briefings and many other proactive safety actions. If you are lucky enough to work for such a company, you should be proud of yourself and your fellow employees and continue to strive for zero injuries.

It’s a warm summer day in San Diego. The temperature is 85 degrees, the relative humidity is 30 percent, and winds are out of the west at 10 to 15 miles per hour. A utility crew from San Diego Gas and Electric (SDG&E) is performing maintenance on a broken cross-arm on a wooden 69-kilovolt transmission pole. Suddenly, a phase-to-phase contact causes a shower of sparks, igniting the dry grass below. The fire grows quickly and blackens several square feet of grass around the pole. A crew from SDG&E’s wildfire contractor, Fire Stop, has been working next to the utility crew. As a precaution, the Fire Stop crew had already positioned a dry hose line within 25 feet of where the fire started and had placed firefighting hand tools and a dry chemical extinguisher nearby.

Hydraulic tools and equipment have come a long way over the past several decades and even over the last several years. Utilities and many other industries rely on hydraulic tools, equipment and systems to get the job done. Getting the job done is always a big concern, but the priority should always be on getting the job done safely.

In the electric utility industry, there are several often-asked questions about FR clothing. The following questions and answers address many common concerns.

Ground grids provide a fundamental safety feature in substations and should be tested periodically. Unfortunately, some are approaching 100 years old and haven’t been tested in many years.

Use of arc suppression blankets can help reduce arc flash/blast injuries. When properly installed, arc suppression blankets absorb or deflect heat and blast energy emitted from an arc event, reducing the event's impact on workers.

To be absolutely clear – there is an arc hazard in the utility workplace. There is also a need for protecting employees with arc protective clothing. If you are responsible for hazard mediation, you should have an arc protection program or at least a plan to begin a program. Regularly, people call me and ask what they should do about NFPA 70E: Standard for Electrical Safety in the Workplace; and therein lies the problem. NFPA 70E is not the solution to utility arc flash hazards.

Choosing the correct fall protection equipment for climbing transmission structures

Despite the economic downturn, the wind energy industry is growing rapidly and establishing itself as a prominent, sustainable solution that will help generate enough power to help meet current and future demands for renewable energy. Global leaders recognize that wind power can and will be one of the largest sources of new electricity generation. The United States is taking a strong position in this industry; the Obama administration is supporting wind power with an aggressive renewable energy stimulus to back it financially and foster continued growth within the industry.

The Department of Labor, Bureau of Statistics, says tower climbers have “the most dangerous job in America.” Steve Fleming, Director of Antenna & Tower Training at Safety One International (www.SafetyOneInc.com), says that on average accidents on towers and cranes lead to 25 deaths per year. Fleming further suggested that close to 80 percent of the deaths at communication towers over the period of 1992-2001 were attributed to falls.

Two standards are needed to specify clothing for high visibility and flame resistance. Most companies in the U.S. choose ANSI 107 (for high visibility) and ASTM F1506 (for flame-resistance clothing complying with NFPA 70E or OSHA 1910.269). Citing both means you will have clothing (shirts and vests primarily) that are highly visible and arc- and flash-fire resistant. However, the flame-resistance side is often a weakness because of manufacturers or marketers who push “flame-resistant” standards that are misleading or outright deceptive.

Beyond information peculiar to technical crafts, every person who enters a substation has a common need to understand substation grounding. This includes things to look for that might indicate problems in the station’s grounding system.

Substation grounding plays the primary role in several key aspects of fault clearing, equipment preservation and, most importantly, personnel protection as well as protection of the passing public. In fact, if the ground grid in a station were not in place, anyone standing next to a breaker that operates stands a good chance of being shocked, if not killed.

Progress Energy is a Fortune 250 investor-owned electric utility company that comprises generation, transmission and distribution businesses and a general services company. Progress Energy’s 11,000 employees serve 2.9 million customers over a 50,000-square-mile retail service area in North Carolina, South Carolina and Florida.

Drop into any hardware store or home improvement center, and you’re likely to find aisles full of tools labeled “ergonomic.” But what exactly does that mean? Simply put, ergonomics is the science of designing and producing tools and other work-related implements that improve a worker’s efficiency while reducing discomfort, fatigue, and risk of injury.

Construction professionals understand the importance of not damaging buried utilities while performing any type of new construction and maintenance work. Even so, accidental strikes of underground utility lines continue to interrupt essential services, cause millions of dollars in damage, result in serious injuries, and in some cases, loss of life.
 

The Generic Error Modeling System (GEMS) has developed a framework for understanding error types and designing error prevention strategies.

Some utility personnel have resisted arc-flash compliance with the presumption that arc flashes and blasts are not a major issue for the utility industry. Organizations and standards committees such as IEEE (Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers), NFPA70E (National Fire Protection Association), EPRI (Electric Power Research Institute), CRN (Cooperative Research Network) and others confirm this as a false statement. An IEEE study concluded, “To decrease the number and severity of non-fatal electrical burn injuries, direct worker exposure to electrical arc energy must be reduced.”

Accidents happen when we least expect them. “Why?” is usually the first question. The common follow-up analysis is, “How could I have let this happen?”

If you consider personal safety equipment inconvenient and uncomfortable to wear, you may want to consider the alternatives.

San Diego Gas & Electric recently hosted a Western Fall Restraint Conference. SDG&E is moving forward in establishing safer climbing practices and knew they would benefit from bringing their western partners together to share what has worked for them in launching a new program, best practices, equipment concerns and overall experiences.